Stockton woman's film set for S.F. fest

Monday

Sep 26, 2005 at 3:00 AMSep 26, 2005 at 3:07 AM

Barbara Dunton is an unlikely crusader against corruption.

Brian McCoy

Barbara Dunton is an unlikely crusader against corruption.

The Stockton resident only came to the cause after retiring in 2001 from San Joaquin County's human resources division. Long interested in moviemaking, she enrolled in a Modesto Junior College documentary film course.

From that course emerged "San Francisco's Broken Promise," the half-hour documentary Dunton produced with instructor Carol Lancaster Mingus. An examination of the politics and profit behind the decision to dam Yosemite National Park's Hetch Hetchy Valley, the movie will be screened Thursday at the second San Francisco World Film Festival.

Organizers selected "San Francisco's Broken Promise" to join the festival's 40-film roster because Dunton and Mingus told their story with passion and clarity, said festival director Karen Gabai.

"It's not easy to make a documentary where people can walk away with a clear idea of the topic, and these women did that," she said. "They did a great job in telling people the truth behind the story."

Mingus assigned Dunton, 57, and her classmates in the spring 2002 course to produce a documentary on Hetch Hetchy, which was considered the Yosemite Valley's twin before being turned into a reservoir.

But Dunton's research turned up a larger story. The Lodi native found 35-year-old articles from the Bay Guardian newspaper that revealed there was more to Hetch Hetchy than the environmental angle.

In 1913, Congress passed the Raker Act, allowing San Francisco to build a dam in the otherwise pristine valley with the proviso that it would create a municipal power district. Instead, the city granted Pacific Gas and Electric exclusive rights to sell the power generated by the dam and pocket the profits. This policy continues today despite a 1940 U.S. Supreme Court decision finding San Francisco in violation of the act.

By semester's end, the class had amassed hours of interviews with the likes of Bay Guardian editor Bruce Brugmann and former San Francisco city council member Angela Alioto. Dunton became determined to get the story out.

"We had such good stuff," she said. "It just had to be told."

It would be two years, however, before director Mingus could clear her schedule to finish "San Francisco's Broken Promise." The movie premiered in April at the Sacramento International Film Festival.